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Detective Guapo Approved: The Pilot Project

I really, really like procedural dramas. I like them like you would a bad boyfriend. I go on binges then I do everything in my power to stay away – bury myself in actual work or get off the grid. It’s the kind of stuff that affects me to an unhealthy degree. I’m not being hyperbolic, I swear. I could talk about that one time I received an ominous email from a company about a recent ‘immediate termination’ of someone I was supposed to meet with. I began speculating reasons for his termination by looking at past behaviours and conducting interrogations in my head. It was a little unhealthy. (If anyone’s curious, the interrogation room in my head is the cold, clinical, dimly lit, concrete-walled room characteristic of the ‘local’ precinct; you’ll also find a really sexy detective, by the name of Detective Guapo, slamming his fists and demanding the truth.)

Law & Order SVU is owned by NBC, but let’s be real, it’s the Mariska Hargitay Show.

No need to call the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit; I’m not crazy (yet). But please feel free to call Shemar Moore. The thing is, I get really invested in TV shows but I also fall out of them relatively quickly. I give a lot of pilots a shot; maybe watch a few episodes in, and then I’m over it. There are a handful of shows that I’ve watched religiously from start to finish, and then there are the fast loves – the ones that take over my life as fast as they burn out. Procedural dramas fall under fast loves.

Where am I going with this?

Looking over this list from Wikipedia, I can say that I’ve seen at least ten on this list; but I’ve never watched them in their entirety. Granted these shows are usually a case-a-week with a story arc spanning a season. So it’s not totally necessary to see every episode chronologically. Still, I have this unhealthy addiction and it’s not going anywhere so I might as well make something out of it.

This is the part where I introduce an idea for a blog project. Let’s call it The Pilot Project, because alliterations are cool and it sounds a lot more important than it actually is. Every week or so, I’ll go on Netflix and check out a pilot I’ve never seen before. Maybe it’s a hyped up show that I never got into, or maybe it’s one of those shows that the studios cancelled mid-first season. I was thinking of starting with my fast loves (procedurals) and working my way to more critically acclaimed, dare I say more intellectual, shows.

It’s going to be tough keeping up with this mind-bender. Pretty Little Liars is owned by ABC Family.

It’s probably not fair to watch a pilot and surmise an opinion of the show based on one episode alone. Didn’t a lot of people say that the first episode of Breaking Bad was shit? I personally didn’t think so, but a lot of people were afraid that the first episode wouldn’t be enough to hook people in. The same story’s told with the first season of Parks and Recreation, and it’s one of my favourite sitcoms. So yeah, this is probably a terrible idea. But my intention is not to review the shows. Chances are most of them premiered over ten years ago; so no one will be checking for my posts. I just want to write my reactions and see if I can find a pattern to determine whether or not I personally think a show is worth pursuing.

I don’t know. These are just ideas. I’m still not sure where this blog is going. Right now, it’s kind of a clusterfuck, which is fitting because it perfectly describes where my head’s been for the last decade.

So keep your eyes peeled. The first installment of The Pilot Project will be up sooner than you can binge watch all three seasons of House of Cards. Or, you know, you could prove me wrong.